Very much so, as Chicago guitarist Joel Paterson and friends established Friday night at the Green Mill Jazz Club.

Though not entirely devoted to holiday fare, Paterson’s show was designed to celebrate the release of his newest album, “Hi-Fi Christmas Guitar,” an ultra-sleek recording that — like much of Paterson’s career — turns conventional wisdom upside down.

For starters, Paterson belongs to a small but sophisticated coterie of Chicago jazz musicians who make early- and mid-20th-century musical traditions seem very nearly contemporary. Groups such as the Modern Sounds and the Fat Babies prove that great repertoire never gets old, as new generations of musicians refract it via contemporary sensibilities.

That strategy, though, becomes all the more risky when you attempt to apply that retro-chic aesthetic to the world’s most overplayed music: holiday tunes.

Yet listen to Paterson, bassist Beau Sample and drummer Alex Hall deconstruct Christmas music, and you’re forced to admit that there’s still something new to be said inside of these songs.

Paterson and the trio opened with one of the best of the bunch, “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” the spare lines and elegant understatement of his solo guitar cutting to the essence of the piece. Moreover, by intertwining the famous melody with alternate themes, Paterson evoked the spirit of Les Paul, whose innovative overdubbing techniques established the template for this kind of sound.

Paterson’s “Hi-Fi Christmas” album amounts to an homage to Paul, and by performing several compositions from the album, Paterson not only articulated his debt to the old master but also showed how Paul’s influence resonates in jazz-guitar playing today.

Nowhere was that more apparent than in the cheekiest moment of the set, when Paterson played a solo version of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus,” but accompanied by that track from the recording (minus the lead guitar). In effect, Paterson was overdubbing his live solo part with the already overdubbed track, as fitting a salute to Paul as one might imagine. To hear Paterson weaving all these melodic threads in real time was to appreciate anew Paul’s genius, as well as Paterson’s heartfelt testament to it.

This was the most ambitious moment of a set that otherwise reveled in the joy of familiar tunes sweetly played. Believe it or not, Paterson spun worthy new motifs from “Jingle Bells” and, stepping away from seasonal repertoire, evoked Chet Atkins’ fingerpicking manner in “Caravan.”

Part of the beauty of this set lay in the way Paterson, Sample and Hall functioned as a single rhythmic organism, their long years of partnership evident in the imperturbable synchronicity of their work.

But not everything was about Christmas, Paterson inviting singer Oscar Wilson and organist Chris Foreman to the stage for deep excursions into the blues. Wilson’s urgent vocals on “Reconsider Me” benefited from Foreman’s staccato chords and abrupt swells of sound on Hammond B-3 organ.

When Wilson left the stage, Paterson and Foreman partnered on the slowest version of “Winter Wonderland” I’ve ever heard, the performance just barely hanging together thanks to the guitarist’s consistently sustained melodic lines and Foreman’s atmospheric accompaniment (including an evocative blues coda).

Sure, most of this music fell quite gently on the ear. But when the old tunes are played with this degree of polish and savvy, it’s impossible to resist.

And if you can’t indulge in some musical confections around the holidays, when can you?